Knitting
by TheDrunkenWerewolf
Summary: in her downtime to make up for the devastation she caused as Darquesse, Valkyrie knits hats for the homeless. Skulduggery... tries to knit hats for the homeless to keep her company. Family/friendship with some humour. Set after Dying of the Light.


A/n- this is for Skulduggery Pleasant Fanclubs contest. yes I know im cutting it VERY FINE with the deadline and flying like Icarus so close to the sun here, [I wrote this in 30 mins and typed it up in the following 30 mins and I'm 2 hours to go til the deadline how's that for cutting it fine?]

I've only recently been introduced to this amazing book series (thankyou Catsafari!) but I'm plowing through and I'm loving every minute of it. So I wanted to write for it. Even though Writing for a new fandom is so like driving a new car and just trying not to crash. But i needed this and it decluttered a lot of headspace and i really just want to show my love for the series :)

Notes: this is set after Dying of the Light. So... spoilers i guess? Family/friendship ficlet. Me projecting heavily onto Valkyrie. Enjoy.

Summary - in her downtime to make up for the devastation she caused as Darquesse, Valkyrie knits hats for the homeless. Skulduggery... _tries_ to knit hats for the homeless to keep her company. Family/friendship with some humour.

* * *

Knitting

"I've sprained my fingers from too much knitting."

Valkyrie huffed a sigh and lowered her own knitting needles as well so she could give him a _look_. "Skulduggery, you don't have any muscles to sprain."

The living skeleton turned to her and she knew if he had a face it would have been drawn in an expression of exasperation. "My fingers can still ache from knitting, Valkyrie." He answered.

"Yes, but you should say that they ache instead not that you 'sprained' them. That means something different."

"Fine." He huffed. "Then my fingers ache from too much knitting. Happy?"

"Yes."

"You don't sound very happy," he remarked.

"I'm happy!" She answered back. Almost shouting. "Look. This is my happy face."

He studied her face for a few moments, going "hmm" and looking most thoughtful. "You don't look very happy." He said finally. "If that's your 'happy face', I'd hate to see your 'angry face'."

She scowled.

"Oh dear," he said, "That must be your angry face."

"Just shut up and knit." She told him and tried to focus on finishing the hat she was knitting. Trying to imagine the face of the homeless person smiling as they wore it around the streets of Roarhaven City. It was a better visual than Skullduggery complaining at any rate. And ten thousand times better than the memories of her time spent as Darquesse that plagued her almost daily now.

In the background she heard him huff (again), and resume his knitting. Or, his attempts to knit, anyway.

_At least he's trying for you_, a voice inside her head said. She smiled to herself at that thought and focused on her task.

_Knit, knit, purl. Knit, knit, purl. _

Maybe it couldn't make up for all of the terrible atrocities she'd committed as Darquesse, (like actually making all those people homeless), but it certainly felt right to try. Knitting hats for a homeless charity was a good place to start.

It was a damn sight better than wallowing in her own dark thoughts and guilt at least. And Skullduggery had been trying to drag her back into doing things.

She wasn't quite ready to go back to being a Sanctuary Detective again, but one small step at a time. When she was ready, she'd go back. Until that time came, she'd knit hats. And she'd do what she could to make the lives of the people she'd affected a little bit better.

Starting with making knitted hats for the homeless. While Skulduggery... _tried _to make hats for the homeless and struggled along with his own knitting needles beside her, just so he could keep her company because that's what friends did.

"Uh, Valkyrie," he said, after a few minutes of irritable knitting needles click-clacking, muttered curses, and grumbling.

"Yeah what?" She asked, lifting her gaze from her own knitted hat. She was just about to cast off and was already thinking about the colour of the pompom when he called her.

When she looked up, she was astounded. "What the...?"

"I don't think knitting is really my thing."

It was hard not to burst into a fit of giggles at him. The red wool was all tangled around his bony fingers AND the knitting needles. Like some messed up game of cats cradle the kids used to play at school.

"No," she said, snickering just a little. "I don't either."

"Next time can we do something easier, like a bake sale for charity?" He asked, exasperated as she set her needles down and set about untangling his fingers from the wool. _Really, he's hopeless without me_, she smiled, though she didn't give voice to the thought.

"Yeah," she said, "Next time we'll do that."


End file.
